About

Alek Petrov is the co-founder of The Aleksander Foundation. He is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Co. in London advising financial institutions and corporates on a variety of strategic and analytical topics. Before joining McKinsey, Alek spent ~ 10 years in capital markets. At Lehman Brothers he was trading in all types of European structured products – residential and commercial mortgage backed securities, sub-prime mortgages, credit cards etc. His focus was on highly credit-intensive, non rated equity pieces and desk proprietary positions. Before joining Lehman, Alek worked at Merrill Lynch.

Alek has a Ph.D. in Finance and is a CFA Charterholder. He has studied at the University of Vienna in Austria; Central European University in Hungary; Sofia University in Bulgaria; the University of Antwerp, Belgium and the London School of Economics in the UK. He has also held teaching assistant positions at Sofia University and the University of Vienna. He now sits on the Advisory Board of the Center for Risk Studies, Cambridge University.

Acad. Alexander Petrov co-founded The Aleksander Foundation together with his son Alek. He is a renowned scientist having worked in the field of liquid crystal physics for over 50 years both in Bulgaria and internationally. He graduated in atomic physics at the Faculty of Physics of Sofia University in 1970. He received the academic position of Professor in 1990 and was elected a Fellow of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences – Academician in 2003. He worked in the physics of living matter and created the doctrine of bioflexoelectricity, developing a new approach that describes the elasticity and flexoelectricity of biological membranes. In 2018 he was awarded the National Order of “St. St. Cyril and Methodius” for “especially significant merits in the field of education and natural sciences”. He is now the Honorary Chairman of the Bulgarian Physics Association.

Martin Iliev is a graduate of the American University in Bulgaria where he led the campus Investment Management Club as well as other student projects and initiatives. He holds a BA in Economics and is currently pursuing his MSc in Finance at London Business School. His professional interests are in the sphere of financial advisory and investment services. He is also passionate about financial literacy and has been involved in several campaigns on the subject. He has joined our team in early 2020 and is serving as our current Program Director.

Peter Petrov is a Global Director People at Chaos Group leading people and organisational development. Before joining Chaos Peter worked at Ada Health, Ingram Micro and Bosch. Having more than 10+ years experience in the field of learning & development.

Peter has a degree in Psychology, Psychotherapy and Business Management. He has studied at Birkcbeck, College of London and University of Portsmouth; He is a passionate keynote speaker in the field of Leadership, Perfomance and DEI&B.

Yva Alexandrova is an expert in social inclusion and has worked to empower migrants, refugees, Roma, Gypsy and Traveler communities. Yva works for the United Nations International Organization for Migration in Bahrain supporting migrant workers in the region and reporting on the Global Compact on Migration. Previously Yva worked on digital and privacy issues in immigration policy for a digital rights organization and a migrant charity in the United Kingdom. In Bulgaria, Yva has worked on analyzing the economic and social effects of Roma integration for the think-tank Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD). Between 2003-2005. Yva led an international policy cooperation dialogue with the countries of the CIS region for the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) in Austria. She has also worked in India and Tanzania on educational inclusion of children from marginalized groups. Yva is passionate about diversity and inclusion and empowering people to speak with their own voice.

Yva has an MSc in Development Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in the UK, and MA in International Relations and European Studies from the Central European University (CEU) in Budapest and a BA in International Relations from the University of National and World Economy (UNWE), Sofia.

Greetings!

I'm Philip, the CEO of Whiz—a boutique software firm that specializes in crafting and implementing bespoke web, mobile, and software solutions for businesses.

As a strong advocate for Aleksander Foundation's mission and core values, I am actively involved in its digital transformation journey.

I welcome new connections, so feel free to reach out! 😊

Plamen Dokov is a Founding Partner and the Head of Research at Carrhae Capital, an emerging markets investment boutique. Prior to that Plamen was an Investment Analyst at SAC Global Investors. He has held investment and mergers and acquisitions positions at Morgan Stanley, Lazard and HSBC Trinkaus & Burkhardt in Duesseldorf, Germany. Plamen holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration and Economics and is a CFA Charterholder. He has studied at Sofia University in Bulgaria and Universitaet des Saarlandes in Germany.

Ralitsa Petrova is member of the Board of Directors of Interservice Uzunovi, a family business with more than 20 years of experience in the retail of home appliances and furniture (over 320 employees). Ralitsa is also the general manager of Intersolar Varna AD, active in the Bulgarian solar energy sector. Prior to that she was the executive lead of Mall Varna – the first retail mall development in Varna. The mall was sold to an international investor and was the largest Bulgarian commercial real estate deal for 2007.

As an active member of her family business Ralitsa was involved in the development of the Next Generation activities of the Bulgarian Family Business Association serving as President for the younger family business members.

Ralitsa holds a Master from the London School of Economics and a B.A. from the European Business School, London.

Yordan Nedev is Director Investments and M&A at Sirma – the biggest Bulgarian group of IT companies. Previously he served as the CEO at Bianor, another IT company. Further back in time he was the CEO of BDZ (Bulgarian State Railways). He was also a partner at the management consulting company MMD Partners (Bulgaria), in charge of the financial consulting activities at the firm, rendering advisory services to clients on internal financial management and means of financing the business. Parallel to that he was heading a daughter company of MMD Partners – MMD Scale, devoted to implementing IT enterprise solutions – ERP, CRM, BI, HRMS.

In 2003 – 2004 he was the CEO of Investor.bg – the biggest Bulgarian internet media for economic and financial news and fora. He led the company through the first IPO in Bulgaria. Yordan started his professional career at Roland Berger Management Consultants, working on two major privatisation deals.

Yordan holds a Master’s degree in Finance from the London Business School (LBS) and a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Sofia University in Bulgaria. He has also studied at the International Management Center (IMC), Hungary and Complutense University, Spain.

James is an economist and economic commentator, and former political advisor to the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer and chief economist at Britain’s leading independent think tank, the New Economics Foundation. He has published widely on economics and economic policy with a decade of experience working across government and the third sector, and has taught at Sussex, City, SOAS and Cambridge Universities. He holds a first class honours degree from the London School of Economic in economics and economic history, a masters with distinction from the University of London, and completed his PhD in 2013 on macroeconomic modelling.

Eliya Panchova is an LSE Summer school '21 alumna, and a program coordinator at the Aleksandar Foundation since 2022. She is an AUBG '23 graduate, and an M&A intern at PwC Bulgaria. She is pursuing a Master's in Management at London Business School '24, and is also the Chair of the Control Committee at the Bulgarian Debate Association.